Answers

Best Answer: All you can do is try to persuade him. Please click this link and show him this article: https://www.epainassist.com/sports-injur...
which says. "Wrist dislocation usually involves severe damage to the ligaments and if left untreated this can lead to permanent disability." Leaving it untreated for long will also increase his risk for painful osteoarthritis in the wrist, which would further limit use of that hand, years later. Under current medical technology, arthritis can be slowed but not cured, except by surgical replacement, which is not as good a solution as keeping the fully-functioning original joint.

We all do some not-so-smart things like not going soon enough to a doctor and have worse problems to deal with because of the delay later. You can't *make* him go. He's your dad. All you can do is give him the facts and encourage him to make a good decision. Or if that doesn't do it, you can try playing the guilt card: "I want you to be able to play ball with your grandkids, pick them up, hug them without being limited by a lot of pain in your wrist and hand," and so on.

This is no longer a medical emergency; it didn't just happen. He doesn't have to get this treated in a hospital emergency room in most places, and in fact, I wouldn't generally recommend that for an old injury like this, because the ER will x-ray and if there's dislocation or fracture, splint the wrist temporarily and then refer him to an orthopedist for most of his ongoing care, and the orthopedist will probably want to redo everything the ER did including the x-ray and splint etc. (I've seen this happen many times.) This makes the bill a lot higher than it needs to be. He can and should instead call and make an appointment and take an old injury like this directly to an orthopedist's office. Generally this will be much less expensive than an ER plus an orthopedist, at least in the US.

There's an earlier response here which says "the emergency room has to treat all patients," which might lead you to believe that he would be treated there for free if he has no insurance. That's a common misconception, and it is *not* true with a wrist injury in the US. People with potentially life-threatening symptoms (such as chest pain, trouble breathing, stroke symptoms, high soaring fever with other signs of infection etc.) *have to* be treated if they show up at any US hospital ER (and they'll expect payment for a patient with no insurance), but all a private hospital *has* to do is try to stabilize a patient with life-threatening symptoms, and if they succeed, they can release him, even if he would benefit from further hospital care, especially if he can't pay for it. But because an old wrist injury is not life-threatening, a private hospital ER does not *have* to treat him (though they generally will--and then bill him). Sometimes a US hospital or doctor's office will negotiate lower charges for somebody who has no insurance, but that's at their discretion. Just don't believe that somebody with no insurance and an old wrist injury can go get it treated for free at a US hospital emergency room because "they have to"--that is untrue.

Your parents might be in the habit of ignoring any input that comes from a place of anger or resentment as "rebellion" or "being dramatic". If you're very upset they may be interpreting it differently than you intend. Or, they may be really worried about their finances and desperately hoping nothing expensive will happen right now. (Edit: It is also possible they know from experience that you will heal from this level of a sprain with time. If you ask for their reasons they might explain.) https://thepainreliefpractice.com/knee-p...
This doesn't make ignoring your pain and concern okay, but you're going to have to work around their actual attitude, even though it's not the perspective you wish they had.